SMASH provides the ability to remotely manage a platform independent of machine state, operating system state, server system topology or access method – interoperable management is possible before the OS is operational, when the OS is hung, or while the OS is up.

SMASH specifies two protocols which server platforms can expose to provide a standards-based management interface for simple and intuitive management of heterogeneous servers in the data center: web services and command line. The web services-based protocol is described in the DMTF's Web Services for Management (WS-Man) specification.

The command line based protocol is described in Server Management Command Line Protocol (SM CLP). SM CLP has been adopted and published by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) as ISO/IEC 13187:2011 and the American National Standard Institute (ANSI) International Committee for Information Technology Standards (INCITS) as INCITS 438-2008.